Designer I Love: Sarah Richardson

One day last summer, I was home and not feeling well. I was flipping through the TV channels, trying to find something interesting to keep me occupied. I came across a Sarah's House marathon on FLN (Fine Living Network, now currently Cooking Channel). After one episode I was hooked. I love Sarah, her assistant Tommy, her style and personality. Having just bought our house, getting married, and trying to decorate it, I couldn't imagine buying a house and gutting it to redesign the rooms to make the house exactly what you want.
What I like most about Sarah's style is the way she mixes textures and patterns through fabric. It completely makes the room.
Here are just two examples of Sarah's amazing work, as seen here.


I love the blue and tan combo, very classic furniture shapes, and the perfect (but not overly styled) accessories.

Sarah actually designed the bed and had it upholstered. I love the color palate and, again, the fabric choices. In this episode, Sarah made a point of saying that you need to keep a balance of masculinity and femininity when designing a bedroom. She pulled in the masculine side with the dark dresser (not shown) and men's suit fabric and tailored, clean lined, furniture.

Sarah's House is actually and HGTV Canada show. Episodes run in the states on Saturday nights on HGTV (sadly there is no more FLN). Since I'm not always here, and sometimes forget, I haven't been able to see all the episodes from each season. I tried looking up the show on Hulu.com but it is not there. But a select few episodes from Sarah's House (3?) are available here. That season, Sarah buys a farm house and completely renovates it to make it modern, while keeping the country, farm, rustic, classic look.
If you haven't seen her show, I highly recommend watching an episode. I think it'll suck you in, like it did to me last year.

UPDATE: You can see all the seasons online at HGTV Canada. I don't know why I didn't look there before.